Necromancy - Tumblr Posts
(assuming the others are still possible, just less common)
Bright commits crimes against reality.
Ice is an a$$hole. Like, he will be sarcastic, he will roast you, he will take a rude tone to the O5 Council, he's just not nice to people at first.
However, if you can tolerate him for more than maybe six months, he'll start to warm up to you. Maybe. This does not apply if you don't at least try to be nice to him, and the nicer you are to him, the nicer he'll be to you.
People don't often manage this, but somehow, Bright did. Bright, notorious at the time for being completely unlikable. Gears did somewhat, but was also highly abus1ve.
Somehow, the two most unanimously disliked people in the Foundation ended up getting quite close. Bright was even one of the few people who knew Ice's real name (Personally, I like Julian Sylvester-Finn, got both bio father and step-father's last names)
And then, Ice d1es. Bright is the one to find his b0dy. Out of everyone in the small group of people who could even somewhat tolerate each other, Bright takes this the hardest. This is around the time of the creation of the first chainsaw cannon.
Also around this time, Bright goes to his mother, Evelyn Bright. She works with Prometheus Labs. She basically says, 'Well, if you don't want him d3ad, you could just bring him back to life!'
Bright is horrified by this prospect, his own worst experiences being connected to getting brought back to life through 963, but slowly, the idea starts to grow on him. He wouldn't have to make the resurrection permanent, after all. Just reanimate the b0dy, put the mind and soul back in, a few stitches here and there, Ice didn't have blood thanks to his temperature so that wouldn't be a problem...
Then, Kondraki d1es. This is the first major leap towards choosing necromancy that Bright takes. And finally, at least a decade later, Claire Lumineaux d1es. This is what finally pushes Bright over the edge.
First, he has Nobody hack into the alarms and turn them off. Then, breaks into SCP-049's containment cell and breaks the Doctor out. After that, he grabs SCP-073 and briefs him on the plan, leaving some details out. Cain thinks this is a horrible idea, but goes along with it because he doesn't want Bright to get severely injured or permanently k1lled.
Together, the three of them get exactly 1 mile away from the Site unhindered before encountering Clef. Bright explains the plan and Clef is on board 100%. Clef has no qualms with mildly breaking the fabric of reality.
The four of them are now home free, hitting three different graveyards on three different states (Texas for Claire, Nevada for Kondraki, Michigan for Iceberg) and stealing three c0rpses.
Cain and 049 translate some of the details in 049's notebook, Bright uses his expertise on the amulet, and Clef bends reality a bit to make all of this possible.
And finally, at the crack of dawn, seven hours later, on a freezing cold winter night in Eagle Harbor, Michigan, James Abel Lumineaux discovers the secrets of necromancy, and Ice, Claire and Kondraki are back.
This Is Cooler Than I Thought It Would Be
Everyone always has a go at necromancers but it's built in to the way we categories magic
I suggest we make a petition to rename dark magic
I have some suggested alternatives
A Guide to Graveyard Work
One of the earliest introductions I had to spirit work as a baby witch was graveyard work. In short, this practice involves building relationships with the deceased spirits of a graveyard, by communicating, leaving offerings and being mindful of their space. It is part of a wider practice known as death work, but this focuses specifically on how to enter and respect what is essentially the 'home' of the spirits you are working with. You can further build on your practice from this.
This is a handy guide to the different aspects of the practice, looking into the appropriate offerings and etiquette, written with a lot of love.
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Graveyard Etiquette
There are rules you must follow in graveyards, whether for your personal safety, out of politeness, or following the law of your country. Sometimes these overlap. But sometimes, the rules you hear might be no more than baseless superstition, which there is a lot of concerning graveyards. There are way too many superstitions to list, however -
Some good rules to follow are:
Don't begin this work with the intention of taking from the graveyard or using the spirits in your practice. In the same way you wouldn't take from a stranger, it's important to build a relationship before you ask for things.
Try not to stand on graves where possible, out of respect for the dead but also those mourning them. Sometimes, graveyards are set up so that it is impossible to go anywhere without stepping on something, which is okay so long as you're not intending disrespect. However, do be wary that headstones can fall and the ground can shift.
Some people believe you shouldn't take any photos of the graves. I personally think that if the grave is old enough, it doesn't matter too much. If the grave is modern, it might be inappropriate for those in mourning to see you taking photos.
You can clean up trash, but be mindful of what might be considered trash. Obvious thrown-away food and drink packaging might be appropriate to clean up, but what if someone left a deceased one's favourite food at their grave? Or what if you decide to get rid of a toy or letter left there? Try to avoid cleaning up around the actual graves and focus on cleaning near the gates or in empty areas.
Don't trespass! If the cemetery has set entry times, enter and leave only within those times. Don't jump the fence, and don't enter any areas that are clearly gated or off-limits.
Leave an offering when asking to take something from the cemetery grounds. I don't feel it necessary to leave an offering each time you enter, especially if you plan on visiting often. But, if you want to take something like graveyard dirt or plants growing there, leave an offering for sure. And make sure to ASK. If you feel wrong, it's a no.
If you EVER find anything askew in a graveyard, such as vandalism, theft, or even dug up bones (it happens, I've found them before) PLEASE report it straight to the groundskeeper, associated church, or relevant authorities. It is not your responsibility to attempt to fix these things, or take things for yourself.
Offerings
You can leave offerings at the gate, or on specific graves if you want to work directly with that spirit. You don't always need to leave an offering, but it is a good thing to do when building a relationship and especially when asking to take from the site.
Some good offerings are:
Coins, especially two coins. There is a belief that the two coins are placed on the eyes of the deceased to pay the ferryman taking them over the river Styx. This has been maintained as a tradition.
Flowers. Even better if you look into Victorian flower symbolism for older grave sites and base your offering on this.
Origami. I would often fold multiple tiny cranes and leave them as offerings on individual graves. The best part is they are biodegradable.
I would be wary of leaving any kind of food or drink, as you might attract animals or even cause harm to the ecosystems living there. The same goes for anything made of plastic or that could hurt an animal.
Natural items such as seashells, feathers or stones are great, safe options for offerings.
You could also burn a candle or incense, but remember to stay with them while they burn and make sure they are extinguished when you leave.
Offerings don't have to be physical - you could say a few kind words, sing to them, or even just dedicating time to sit with the dead or talk with them can be an offering in itself.
Protection
I personally don't go into my practice thinking I could get possessed or followed by a demon at any given moment. However, I do think it's important to remember that graveyards can be full of a lot of upset, angry, and occasionally malevolent energies. Even if you don't intend to, these energies can attach to you or be taken home by you and can make you feel off.
Here are some ways you can protect yourself:
Cleanse yourself before and after entering a cemetery, even just by meditating and visualising or by using incense.
Check out my post on shielding techniques, and try to familiarise yourself with the visualisation techniques until you feel comfortable doing them.
Charm an item of clothing, such as a piece of jewellery, as an amulet to ward against negative energies that you can wear.
Find or create a protective sigil or rune that you can draw on something or on yourself.
You can pray to any deities you work with to ask for protection, especially if these deities are associated with death or spirits.
Communication
People who practice death work might communicate with the dead in different ways. They might be clairvoyant, use divination, feel energies or sometimes even just know what the spirits are saying. In any sense, spirit communication is a skill that is very much required in this practice. @koscheys-skull said it best here. You need good communication skills, in the sense that you are still talking to PEOPLE. And you need to go in with good intentions. If you are going in purely with the intention of using the dead for your own benefit, you won't get very far. If you can't talk to and actively listen with some semblance of empathy, you won't get very far. Death work is not an aesthetic, it is not for you to take your emo photos and be disrespectful. it is a serious, difficult and tolling practice that takes a lot of time and refining.
If you have gotten this far, I wish you all the best. It is a difficult but ultimately fulfilling part of spirit work, and if you are ready to dedicate the time and effort to it, you will get a lot out of it.
Thanks for reading! Please visit my tags for more guides, and feel free to reach out with requests for more information. Lots of love.
Since I started writing I really have searched some very odd things. Sometimes very random things that likely make me look very suspicious but at the same time I have learnt so many things that I never would even knew existed if I never started writing. Just to give a few examples, honestly quite a lot of random historical people whose name's I somehow thought of when naming my own characters. That alone has taken up much of my time just reading about these supposedly famous historical people.
Then on the complete other side in one of my later chapters I have one of my races who have made a city basically inside a volcano and I did an absurd amount of research into rocks, lava, magma, how volcanoes work, whether certain aspects would really make any kind of sense and many other odd things.
Though the worse things I have researched are most likely to do with necromancy, I mean anyone who has a load of searches looking up the dead/undead and trying to find out if there are any ancient necromancy books probably look a tad bit suspicious (Not that I secretly want to be a necromancer or anything).
But honestly I think it is all worth it, I really enjoy having the excuse to learn all of this stuff that without writing I never would have even considered.
A city where necromancy is legal and actually a part of every day society. So long as you follow a specific set of laws to make it seem a bit more ethical, you’re allowed to use it to do anything from helping you in a fight, to helping you run your business. In fact, there are entire shops or restaurants where the staff are undead. Laws to handle the undead could be things like:
• The corpses used cannot have flesh on them for sanitary reasons, especially in the case of businesses. Those who raise undead who are more than just bone will face a fine dependent on their situation.
• Similar to how people can donate their bodies to science, or donate their organs to those in need, people can choose to donate their bodies to necromancers before their death.
• If it is unknown if a person wished for their body to be donated after death, and they have been dead for 150+ years, you’re allowed to raise them. If next of kin is still alive, you must get permission from them first.
• You must take care of the undead in your charge. Keep them clean and unbroken. If one of them starts to get too much wear and tear, you are required by law to respectfully lay them back down to rest. Failure to do this will get you a hefty fine.
There’s no context for this. I just wanted to draw a creepy guy holding an eyeball. So I did.
Peace, Love, and a whole lot of Darkness! 😈
Lemuria
He wrote his name in the air, using his wand to produce glowing letters, then changed it from ‘Tom Marvolo Riddle’ into ‘I am Lord Voldemort’. This confirmed three things. Firstly, that Tom was actually descended from the House of Gaunt and, by extension, Salazar Slytherin himself. She had suspected this ever since he had asked her about his father back in second year and then inquired about Marvolo (and then proceeded to steal her wand). Secondly, Tom hated his name – which came as no surprise because it was so very Muggle – and wanted to change it into something… more. And thirdly, Tom was, frankly speaking, delusional.
Naenia Proserpina Lémure was a pureblood, rich and a Necromancer. Tom Marvolo Riddle was a halfblood at best, poor and always got what he wanted. What Tom Marvolo Riddle wanted was respect. He wanted power. And he wanted immortality. When the chance to get all of that presented itself in one single person, there was no way he wouldn’t take it. A story about the friendship between a stoic Necromancer and a power-hungry orphan.
On AO3
Blue of Blood
Being a Slytherin wasn’t always easy. Balancing pureblood politics, house rivalries and inter-house friendships with ‘mudbloods and blood traitors’ often made for a rather eventful school life. Being related to the most infamous family of Necromancers in Britain and a close friend of the Boy Who Lived on top of that just called for disaster.
Lynea had hoped accepting her fate and serving Death would be the end of her struggles – dealing with the living was nuisance enough. So if the rest of the wizarding world could get over themselves and start behaving like responsible adults already, instead of blotching up even the simplest of tasks (and maybe stop being so bloody afraid of Death along the way, honestly, it was just a serial killer mutilating their victims) that would be much appreciated.
On AO3.
Part two of Old Magics.
A Touch of Death
When a Dark Lord refuses to announce his return and the Ministry decides your headmaster is just a barmy old man telling lies, what do you do? And the Dark Lord was back, he had been over for tea, after all – Lynea would recognise that face anywhere.
Well, as long as he didn’t go around murdering people, she supposed it was fine. He wasn’t even attacking Harry, despite the two of them being prophesised to clash because ‘neither can live while the other survives’ or something like that. If the Dark Lord had decided to lie low, maybe they could actually focus on more imminent threats – like the pink toad that was going around torturing students or the Necromancer family from the continent that actually cursed people for fun. But who was Lynea to judge that?
On AO3
Sequel to Blue of Blood and part three of Old Magics
Lémure – the name every child in the magical world learned to fear. With a long history of Necromancers who worshipped Death, it was only natural that people feared them, because most people were afraid of death and for the Lémures Death was sacred. They were powerful, because they practiced the Old Magics. They were respected, because people feared death and therefore them. They were old and ancient, because in death He granted them immortality.
A series of fanfiction telling the story of Tom Riddle and his Necromancer friend from their meeting at Hogwarts, through the eyes of Harry Potter’s generation, and until the end of times.
With the fourth and final part published, this series is officially complete.
A Murder of Crows
Tom looked at the twisted body at the bottom of the stairs for a moment, unable to comprehend what had just happened. His arms and legs were spread at odd angles and his neck twisted in a way that couldn’t be comfortable – or, well, wouldn’t have been comfortable, had Billy still been alive. He definitely wasn’t alive anymore. There was no way he was. “They will never believe it was an accident,” Naenia said calmly. Tom winced and cursed under his breath as he looked over at her. “We need to get rid of the evidence.” Naenia mustered the body with a contemplative look on her face. “Naenia?” She turned to him. “I have an idea. Let’s reanimate his body.”
In which a young Tom Riddle meets a Necromancer at the orphanage and things do not turn out for the better, at all.
On AO3
An undead Necromancer decides to try her hand at the Defence Against the Dark Arts position at Hogwarts, School for Witchcraft and Wizardry. The Jinx is not happy, but not the most creative, either.
Or: How many times does a DADA professor have to die, before they give up and let the Jinx win? (The answer is: Too many. The Jinx never stood a chance)
Manea Killgrave from A Blessing and a Curse on AO3
a series of perfectly normal family portraits
When Tom is six years old, a woman visits the orphanage he has lived his entire life in to take a look at the children. When Tom turns seven years of age, mother starts having him help around the mortuary. Tom is eleven when the man in purple robes visits their home to personally deliver a letter to him. Tom is thirteen and thinks his life is cursed. Tom is sixteen years old when he kills someone for the first time. It is an accident. Tom graduates at eighteen and realises for the first time that neither mother nor Meiri have aged a day since he first met them. They haven’t changed at all.
Tom gets adopted by a necromancer. He doesn’t think his life actually changed for the better.
It began like this:
On the night of the 1st of November, little Harry Potter was placed on the doorstep of Mr and Mrs Dursley’s house at Number 4, Privet Drive. The next morning, a scream woke little Harry when Mrs Dursley opened the front door to put out the milk bottles and found him lying there, a letter tucked into his blankets.
Had this been an ordinary baby, the poor thing would have died of hypothermia. But Harry was not an ordinary baby, nor would he grow up into an ordinary child, no matter how much the Dursleys tried to beat the freakishness out of him. Little Harry grew up knowing he was a freak and that he had to keep his freakishness hidden. The easiest way to do so, he found, was to keep his head down and his emotions in check. The anger stopped soon enough. The constant fear he managed to keep close to his chest.
In which a small change in the Dursleys’ treatment of Harry brings about rather significant consequences.
One moment was all it took.
For once in his life, Harry takes notice. A simple observation is all it takes to find himself entangled with a peculiar pair of Slytherins that will turn his life upside down.